Decline in dengue

A DECLINE in the new cases of dengue fever has been reported by the Health Ministry since the end of March.

So far, there have been over 25,300 clinically suspected dengue cases reported each week since January 1 to the week ending May 11.

National adviser communicable disease Dr Mike Kama confirmed that this was probably because of a combination of factors including cooler weather, a decreasing proportion of the population susceptible to the dengue virus and the control measures taken.

"15 deaths have been confirmed in Fiji since December 2013. This has increased by two with new deaths being notified last week, one in April and one in May," Dr Kama said.

"The final death toll will be confirmed once results from samples sent abroad for testing has been received by Ministry of Health. This will take some time.

Dr Kama pleaded with the public to continue with the destruction of mosquito breeding grounds because this was a major contributing factor to the fight against dengue fever.

Dr Kama said what was recorded at 200 dengue fever cases a week in February, March and April had begun to decline towards the end of April.

"We have been registering 50 cases a week in April and just recently in the last two weeks of May we have been registering 20 cases per day of dengue fever.

"In terms of distributing of dengue cases, it remains the same in terms of ethnicity, gender, it's all throughout the age categories, however, the major clean-up campaign has contributed a lot to the decline in numbers.

"At the beginning of this year, the numbers were quite high but this has decreased drastically and the weather was one of the advantages as we head towards the tail end of the outbreak."